I'm going to show you six ideas for patriotic red white and blue cakes, sharing the techniques
for each design and also tips on making your frosting bright blue and really red.
For this first design all you need is an offset spatula or a palette knife.
Spread a thin layer of red or blue frosting around the bottom of the cake after frosting it white and
you can wait for the white frosting to set before you do this or spread this color on straight away.
Use the tip of your offset spatula or even the back of a spoon to swipe the frosting
upwards diagonally, pulling it upwards around the cake to create this pretty rustic texture.
You can do exactly the same thing around the top of the cake to match the bottom,
spreading a thin layer of red or blue frosting around the top and then pulling the tip of your
offset spatula downwards diagonally. I love the uneven top edge of this but if you want it to be
straight I recommend this technique since red and blue frosting are so bold that they can stain the
white frosting on the top of the cake: put the cake in the freezer for 15 minutes and then pour
some boiling water into a glass and dip a knife into it trim around the top edge of the cake,
slicing off the frozen frosting and leaving a neat straight edge behind.
Berries are naturally red and blue and make pretty and delicious decorations. You can line
them up around the bottom or top of a cake and if you've just frosted the cake and the
frosting is still soft, the berries will stick to the frosting easily. If the frosting has set
so it's firm you'll need to spread or pipe a little bit of fresh frosting over the area
where you want to put the berries. Then press the berries gently into that frosting to attach them.
When this frosting sets the berries will be held securely in place so you can move the cake or
transport it worry-free. If you want to be more dramatic with your berry placement, arrange them
in diagonal rows to completely cover the cake. The neatest way to do this is to choose an order,
in this case raspberry, blueberry, blackberry, and press the berries one layer at a time into the
frosting on the cake. I'm not using strawberries because if the berries are a similar size
like raspberries, blackberries and blueberries are, they'll support each other as you layer them
and also, using similar sized berries will create the clearest diagonal lines on the cake.
A red, white and blue cake with so much fruit on it that it's almost healthy! You can use berries
to add red, white and blue to any cake like this chocolate cake, which is perfect if you want
to make a cake look patriotic but still keep the focus on the flavour of the cake instead of using
coloured frosting. For a vintage look use piping to add lots of texture and colour to a cake.
Use a round cookie cutter, pushing the bottom half into the frosting to imprint semi-circles around
the cake as a guideline before you start. This is a petal tip and it's a tiny one, a #102 because
this is such a tiny cake! You'll find a mini cake course and hundreds of other cake designs
and decorating techniques on my cake school and join my ClubPLUS to get access to them all! The
link is in the top of the screen and in the video description. The trick for these ruffles is to
hold the wide end of the petal tip pressed against the cake and point the narrow end downwards,
wiggling your wrist slightly as you pull the piping bag and that creates ruffles in the piping.
Another way to use a petal tip is to make these wavy ribbons and for these you'll need the wide
end of the piping tip to be pointing towards the middle of the cake with the narrow end pointing
out to the edge of the cake. As you squeeze the piping bag and pull it around the cake,
move it quickly up and down to make the waves this looks pretty at the top of the cake and
also around the bottom. Pipe another ruffle using white over the top of the first ruffle,
layering them around the cake. Keep the top of the piping tip (the wide end) pressed against
the frosted cake to attach the top of the ruffle to the cake so that it doesn't droop. You can
pipe these ruffles and this wavy ribbon onto the cake straight after piping the blue buttercream
or if you want to do the piping in stages, you can do it after the first colour sets.
This is my 4 Minute Buttercream and the recipe is on www.britishgirlbakes.com
Now to add red I'm using a small round piping tip, a #3 to pipe strands of frosting around the cake.
My hands are really shaky so if i can pipe these lines, you definitely can!
Keep an eye on the ruffles below so that your lines mimic that curve and line up above them.
Then pipe three tiny dots down from the join of each of the curved lines.
If your buttercream isn't coming out of the piping bag easily it's either too stiff,
so you need to add more milk to thin out the consistency, or you need to twist the end of
the piping bag to apply more pressure to it so that when you squeeze just gently the buttercream
comes out. I'm placing some buttercream roses on top of this cake and you'll find more ideas in my
tutorial on homemade cake toppers and the link for that is in the top of the screen and in the video
description. This next cake design is the quickest because instead of frosting and then decorating
the cake, the frosting is the decoration! After crumb coating a cake, spread red,
white and blue frosting in layers around the cake to completely cover it and then use a cake comb to
smooth the frosting or you could use a textured cake comb if you prefer. The colder the cake is,
the less the colours will blend together so the bolder the separation will be. This cake
has been in the freezer for a few minutes so the edges of each colour are quite dramatic.
Okay, a few tips for colouring buttercream! For a really bright red start with white or
even pink buttercream and add a generous squirt of gel colour and you need more than you think.
Red, blue and really any gel colour will develop and darken with time so you can
make the buttercream a bit lighter than you want it and then cover it with cling film or saran
wrap or a lid and wait about an hour and you'll have an even bolder colour. You can also put it
in the fridge overnight, covered or in a ziploc bag to allow the colour to develop. Which red,
white and blue cake design is your favourite? Tell me in the comments! Thanks for watching!